Scars To Your Beautiful
by Laura Schiller
Summary: Missing scene from "Extras". Tally and David work things out at the Thousand Faces Party.


Scars To Your Beautiful

By Laura Schiller

Based on: _Uglies_

Copyright: Scott Westerfeld

/

"_There's a hope that's waiting for you in the dark_

_You should know you're beautiful just the way you are_

_And you don't have to change a thing, the world could change its heart_

_No scars to your beautiful, we're stars and we're beautiful"_

Alessia Cara, "Scars To Your Beautiful"

/

David stood in a corner of the Thousand Faces Party, feeling overwhelmed. He had never seen so many weird-looking people so close together in his whole life. Udzir floating around with a champagne glass in his toes was just the tip of the iceberg. David was homesick. How his mom would roll her eyes if she were here!

"If you don't get me out of here in five minutes, I swear, I am going to claw someone's eyes out."

The razor-sharp voice coming from behind him belonged to Tally. He held out his arm to her without looking and let her take it, dropping the champagne glass into the recycler in the wall as they passed it by. David smiled to himself. Angry Tally was easier for him to deal with than the crowds, though he knew most of the world's population would disagree.

"Kickers?" he guessed.

"They asked about my relationship with _you,_" she snarled. "As if we were some – some brain-rotting gossip for their stupid feeds - "

"Tally, calm down." He squeezed her arm, firm enough that she'd notice, but light enough that she wouldn't panic. "We're historical figures, like it or not. You can't blame them for being curious."

She raked her free hand through her hair, a leftover gesture from when it had been curly, and growled when she encountered a hairpin Aya Fuse had stuck there while helping her get ready. "Curious? This whole city is sense-missing. Don't they have more important things to worry about?"

"Are you saying our friendship's not important? Don't tell me you're ashamed of being seen with an ugly."

David said it as a joke, but wished he hadn't. There was too much truth in it. He knew perfectly well that Tally didn't mind his face, or she wouldn't spend so much time alone with him in the wild. But still, _not minding _and _liking_ were two very different things, and he would never forget that Tally had shouted at him once to get his ugly face out of here. True, that had been during a crisis; in typical Tally fashion, she could have just said it to get him moving so Dr. Cable wouldn't catch him. But he could never be completely sure.

"David, that's not funny." For a moment, her black eyes were wide with uncertainty, even hurt, a look he remembered from their early days in the Smoke. "I never meant … "

"I know. I'm sorry." He spotted an empty balcony a few steps away, with a view of the torch-lit pleasure gardens. "How about some fresh air to clear our heads?"

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Mm-hm. Those walls didn't look that hard to climb."

"Exactly." She shot him a feral grin and swung her legs over the railing, regardless of the state of her black velvet ball gown or the visibility of her underwear. David, blushing furiously, concentrated on not losing his grip as he climbed down after her.

After the warmth of the crowd, the loud voices, the smells of dozens of nervous, perfumed people and a cloud of NeoFoodie gel, the bumping of elbows and the glitter of hovercams, Nana Love's private garden was a blessed relief. It was dark and quiet, lit only by solar-powered torches and scented with night-blooming flowers. A maze of hedges divided the place into private little nooks, some even provided with furniture that could unfold from chairs into beds if necessary. If anybody else was taking advantage of the privacy, David couldn't hear them. All he heard was the rhythmic chirping and buzzing of insects and the distant sounds of music from the party.

They found a cushioned love seat and, choosing not to think too hard about the significance of the name, David sat down on one side of it while Tally slumped into the other. She had kicked off her high-heeled shoes earlier and now stretched her long, bare legs out in front of her. Her skin gleamed in the torchlight. He had to crane his neck to look at her – the seat was built so that they faced in opposite directions – but he didn't want to look away.

"Now," he said, after a few moments of silence. "What's wrong? Something tells me this is about more than a few nosy reporters."

"Do I have to talk about it?"

He shrugged. "Only if you want to."

She sighed and turned to face him. Her surgically altered eyes gleamed like a cat's in the darkness. They narrowed in annoyance before looking away. "Damn," she muttered. "He was right."

"Who?"

"That bubblehead – okay, _technically-not-a-bubblehead,_" she put on a squeaky voice and a thick Japanese accent, "Frizz Mizuno."

"The one who can't lie?" David had met Frizz only briefly, but the young medical student with his views on Radical Honesty had made quite an impression.

"Uh-huh."

"What did he say to you?"

"He said," Tally rasped, her voice sharper than ever as if it were painful to get the words out, "That I run away from my problems instead of talking about them. Also, that I shouldn't give up kissing even if I did lose the last person I kissed."

Empathy struck David like a punch to the gut. No wonder she needed a quiet place so badly. He was jealous too, and guilty for being so. It shouldn't matter that Zane had been handsome, stylish, tech-savvy, that she'd chosen him over David. Zane was dead. David had no right to be jealous of a dead man.

Even if that man still held a piece of Tally's heart that belonged to no one else.

"You talked to Frizz Mizuno about Zane?"

It was the first time either of them had said his name out loud in months. Even if Tally had brought the subject up first, it still felt like crossing a line.

"Yeah." She snorted. "Turns out Radical Honesty's contagious. It'd be kind of impressive if it wasn't the result of him messing around with his own brain."

David could remember a time when honesty would have saved them both a world of heartache. If Tally had only told him the truth about the tracker in her heart-shaped necklace instead of being dramatic and throwing it in the fire, Special Circumstances might never have found them. His father might still be alive … but on the other hand, there were a million different ways that could have gone and there was no point dwelling on it. Tally probably knew that, which was why she disliked Frizz so much; the younger man had a quality she envied.

"So what problems are you running away from, Tally?" She flashed a cat-eyed glare. "In Frizz's opinion, I mean."

He had asked her similar questions before and she had fallen silent, bounded ahead of him through whatever wilderness they were traveling, snapped at him or simply changed the subject. But the events of the last few days – chasing what they thought were genocidal terrorists that turned out to be benign space colonists, almost blowing up their base, working with curious Aya and honest Frizz, dealing with society for the first time in three years – had left Tally vulnerable in ways none of her conditioning could disguise. David wanted so much to help her … if only she would let him.

He turned away from her to stare straight ahead into a row of rose bushes, knowing that sometimes she found it easier to talk without eye contact. Beside him, he heard her sigh and the velvet of her dress rustle, as if she were shifting uneasily in her seat. Typical; she never could sit still. He could, though. He sat with all of a hunter's trained quietness as he waited for her to speak.

"I was so close, David," she whispered. "So close to destroying everything. My hand was on that button. If it weren't for Aya and Frizz and the rest of them, it would have been the Diego War all over again."

When she whispered, she didn't sound like a Special. She had the same voice he remembered telling him stories in a rainy tent long ago.

"You can't think like that," he said. "Aya and Frizz _were_ there. Everyone's safe. You can't keep thinking _if, _it'll drive you crazy. Trust me, I know."

"Shut up!" she snapped, then let out a growl of frustration. "Sorry. I didn't mean – just let me get this out, okay? Before I lose my nerve."

The bravest woman in the world, losing her nerve at the idea of an honest talk with her closest ally – it would have been funny if it weren't so heartbreaking. All he could do was nod.

"It made me think," she went on. "Who could ever want this? I'll always be like this, you know. I'll always have Dr. Cable's wiring inside me. I _chose_ to stay like this because I couldn't stand another operation. But what kind of a man would want to live with this? I'm a fighter, a pretty damn good one, but what if that's all I'm good for? What if I'm just not built for a life at peace?"

At first, David was so lost for words that all he could do was stare at the sleeves of his dinner jacket, fabricated by Hiro Fuse's hole-in-the-wall. He had never even guessed that she felt like this.

True, 'peace' was a difficult concept to associate with Tally. She seemed to thrive on danger like no one he'd ever met, with the possible exception of Shay. But the young girl he had first fallen in love with, the one with thorn scratches on her skin and nearsighted eyes blinking in wonder at the world around her, had never sought out conflict for its own sake.

All she had wanted was to be comfortable in her own skin, and all that had held her back was her own doubt. Was it any wonder that, underneath all the facades, she was still the same?

"Remember how I told you once," he said, "That the first beautiful thing I noticed about you was your scars? It's still true, Tally."

She jumped up from her seat and came to stand in front of him. She had worn gloves all evening, elbow-length black velvet gloves to match her dress; useless in a place like the Smoke, but very elegant at a party. Now she scowled and yanked them off, ignoring the ripping threads, to show David the long, jagged scars that Shay's Cutter rituals had left on her wrists.

"If you mean these," she said, "They're not even the worst ones."

"I know." He stood up too. She was taller than him now, but not so tall that he couldn't meet her eyes.

"I was ready to kill people and destroy their life's work without even listening to their side of the story," she snarled. "Don't tell me that's beautiful."

"You did listen," he shot back. "You listened and you made peace. Don't tell me that's not beautiful, Tally Youngblood. I've known every version of you, remember? You've always been beautiful to me, and you always will be, because I love you!"

_Shit._

He'd done it now. He'd gone too far. Tact had never been his strong point – look at the mess he'd made in his relationships with Tally and Shay when they first met – but you'd think he would know better than to unload on Tally like this after knowing her for so long. She relied on him, he knew that. In a world that changed from day to day at a dizzying speed, she depended on their friendship staying the same. How would she react when her anchor moved? Would she move alongside him or lose direction altogether?

Still, everything had to change eventually. She should know that better than anyone. And their friendship wasn't only about her. He had a say in it too – and this was something he'd wanted to say every day since he had met her.

Her black eyes narrowed. Her bare hands went to her hips. The flash tattoos on her cheeks spun wildly, revealing how her heart was racing. This must be the face that the retired Dr. Cable saw in her nightmares. Tally was furious … but beneath the fury, he caught a glimpse of exhilaration.

"You word-missing _idiot_," she exclaimed, startling a flock of moths into fluttering in all directions out of the hedge. "What took you so long?"

"I was giving you space," he argued, beginning to smile despite himself, as this was a much more encouraging reaction than he'd expected. "After Zane died - "

"Yeah, well, _I'm _not dead!" That was undeniable. In fact he'd never seen her so alive. Everything about her glowed with vitality tonight, from her sleek dark hair to her flushed face to the fight-or-flight stance of her bare feet on the grass.

"Plus," David added, just to get everything out in the open, "I didn't know if … you know, if I still do it for you. In that way. Dr. Cable did program you to be disgusted at the sight of an ugly, so … "

He moved sideways, letting the torchlight fall squarely on his face, squinting at the brightness with his unsurged eyes. This was the moment of truth. If she recoiled, he'd know that telling her had been a mistake.

She moved closer.

"Have you gone sanity-challenged?" she murmured. The hands that could bend steel and hack buildings were infinitely gentle as she touched his face. "Every time I look at that face of yours, it reminds me of everything we've been through together. Every day in the sunshine," she ruffled his shaggy, sun-bleached hair, "every night in the woods," she ran her finger over the scar across his eyebrow, "Every time you say something mind-blowing or heart-melting," she caressed his too-wide mouth, "And every time you look at me as if I'm a real person," with the softest possible touch of the premature wrinkles around his eyes.

"Did you honestly think," she whispered, her mouth only inches away from his, "That the way you look would be a problem? You're the handsomest man I know."

"That's good to know," said David, placing both his hands on her waist. "Heads up, Tally. I'm going to kiss you now."

Neither of them could tell who closed the last inch of space.

Kissing her as a Special was really not that different from kissing her in her natural body. He had to lean up instead of down, her lips were thinner, her reflexes were faster, and her body under his hands was hard with muscle. But she tasted just the same, she made the same soft little noises, and most of all, she still made him feel as though gravity were a suggestion, not a rule, and he could fly away with her in his arms whenever he wanted. Tally Youngblood, agent of destruction and rebirth, could make him new again with a single touch.

/

They snuck back into the mansion quite a while later (having lost track of time in the garden) and were relieved to find that their absence hadn't been noticed. Apparently some young Crim-in-training had put exploding nanos in the cake, which meant that all the hovercams had powered down and all the big faces were busy cleaning themselves up. Tally and David shared a smirk.

"_There_ you are!" Shay exclaimed, throwing her arms around them both from behind. "Fausto's had the hovercar ready for ages. I was wondering where you'd – hang on a second … "

She sniffed the air between Tally and David like a wolf. David flushed, remembering too late that an enhanced sense of smell had been part of the Specials' modifications.

"Oooh," said Shay, her red-purple eyes flickering. "I get it. Out for a little walk in the pleasure gardens, were you? _Tally-wa and Davy-la, sittin' in a tree?_"

"So mature, Shay-la." Tally spun out from under her friend's arm and gave her a shove away from David. "_This _is why I don't live with you and the others."

"I'm kidding!" Shay giggled, throwing back her head so that the red streaks in her curly hair flickered like flames. "Seriously though, it's about damn time. I was starting to think you were both too balls-missing to ever make a move."

He stood his ground. "As I already told the kickers tonight, no comment."

"Hmph." She folded her arms and sized him up from head to toe. He braced himself for whatever unpleasant comment she might make. He couldn't blame her if she took the news badly, he realized. Three years ago, he had been clumsy and thoughtless in dealing with both girls' emotions. The result was a broken heart and a friendship strained almost beyond repair.

"If you treat her the way you treated me," Shay said, poking David in the chest with one sharp nail, "I'll give you a firsthand demonstration of why my clique was called the Cutters. Is that clear?"

He caught hold of her hand, nails and all, and gave her the firm handshake of one ally to another. "I'd expect nothing less."

"Icy." She smiled, spun around with a toss of her curls, and sashayed away towards the exit. "Now if you bubbleheads are done with this party, we've got a hovercar to catch. I already said your goodbyes for you, so if you want to get home by daybreak, come _on!_"

Tally and David shared a commiserating _that's-Shay-for-you_ shrug behind her back as they followed her. From the corner of his eye, he could see a young couple tiptoeing away, holding hands and giggling, probably to do more or less what he and Tally had done earlier. A flash of purple pigtails and delighted manga eyes showed that it was Aya and Frizz.

Earlier tonight, he would have envied them, and wondered if he'd ever been as carefree as they were. Tonight, he wouldn't change places with the most privileged city-dweller in the world.

He took Tally's hand in his and gave the younger couple a friendly wave goodbye.

They beamed as they waved back.


End file.
